My Geography teacher has started an experiment which involves me writing about what I have learnt in my lessons and about any geographical news that interests me. My Geography teacher is also going to write a blog about what she teaches me (and therefore what I should have learnt!) and hopefully the two blogs will match up. The idea is that this will not only help me to consolidate what I learn but that it will also help fellow students do the same and keep up to date with current issues.

Thursday, 3 March 2011

The Boy Who Harnessed The Wind

The Boy Who Harnessed The Wind is an extraordinary true story of a Malawian teenager who managed to build windmills that eventually provided both electricty and water for the local community and ultimately transformed people's lives forever.......

The book tells the story of William Kamkwamba, a Malawian inventor, who as a child over came many struggles to enable him to apply both his natural curosity for science and his courage to build a windmill in his village. After his parents could no longer afford the school fees (£50 a school year), at the age of 14, he was forced to drop out of school and return to working on the small plot of land, growing maize and tobacco, that his family owned. Despite this though and the fact that whilst magic ruled this region science only existed as a mystery, he never gave up on his dream to become a scientist. However, soon after this, a famine hit Malawi and claimed the lives of thousands and left William's family on the brink of starvation. With little money and the prices of seeds soaring daily, his family had little to plant, let alone eat, and so in the hope that someday he maybe able to reuturn to school William spent most of his time in the local library to try and keep ontop of his studies. He quickly became fascinated by electricty and other forms of energy but it was the picture of a windmill in an old textbook that truly changed his life, and that of those around him, forever.

With no money, William had to scanvege in the local landfill site for the material he needed to build a windmill like the ones he had been reading about. All the locals thought he was mad and even his parents questionned what he was doing. However, he was determined to succeed and eventually managed to build his turbine by using bicycle parts and scrap metal. Once he had built the turbine he was able to light his house and then he added further wiring to provide electricty for charging mobiles and using radios and then went on to develop a system that enabled he to store the excess energy for a day when the wind did not blow. After his success with the first turbine, he has since gone on to build another two turbines and a solar powered water pump that, for the first time, has provided his village with clean water. The impacts his windmills and water pump have had on his village are unimaginable and he managed to create this things from practically nothing and with no education.

So, is this a good geography book............ I personally really enjoyed this book as, although at first I was only reading it because of the obvious link to our current module, it touches on many other geography issues too. The impacts of excessive fuelwood gathering are discussed as everyone in Malawi relied on fuelwood as an energy source but the deforestation that this then created made life for Malawians even harder as without the trees the heavy rain turns to floods and this washes away the soils and its minerals which made growing crops even harder. The problem of deforestation was then only made worse by the fact that big tobacco estates that set up had to clear the land in order to allow tobacco plants to be grown. Also, the Malawian government failed to acknowledge the famine and the suffering that was spreading throughout the country. The situation was created in the first place because the floods and droughts in the previous year had created a food deficit. In addition, the international community pressurised the new government to pay off some of their debts by selling surplus maize, however, the government failed to keep some back for emergencies whilst corrupt officals hoarded the rest of it until it eventually spoiled and other traders, who had managed to buy the maize cheaply via corrupt officals, kept it until the dire situation created the desperation that allowed them to drastically rise the prices. The farmers in neighbouring countries, also did a similar thing and almost doubled food prices. There is also a mention of the Rwandan genocide and other conflict in neighbouring countries and the control excercised by the dictator President Banda over the Malawian people before, in the first election ever held in Malawi, he was voted out. Overall, it is a rather inspirational story which made me really think about the fact that; if a teenager who lacks both the education, technolgy, stability and money that exists in this country, can manage to build turbines and develop solar energy why doesn't renewable energy have a bigger share in our energy mix. We have the technology required to exploit wind energy and yet we chose not to because of the costs and the aesthetical sacrifices we would have to make. If William can overcome droughts and famines and, without any money, equipment, technology or education, still manage to provide electricty for his village by exploiting wind energy what is our excuse for a lack of development in our ability to capture wind energy?

Geography Films

My Geography teacher is always reminding my class that watching (geography related) films can contribute to the 3 hours of reading time we are supposed to do each week. On both her blog and the Facebook page there are lists of recommended films and so I thought I would start to watch some of them and write a review on them from a student's perspective. If I would recommeded them to a fellow student then I will add the film to my own list below.......

- THE AGE OF STUPID (great film to watch for the energy module as it talks about climate change, energy consumption and production via some interesting case studies)

- THE COVE (this film is very thought provoking and presented the issues surrounding the dolphin trade - before watching this I didn't know a lot about the issue, especially the scale of it in Japan, and it left me feeling very shocked that something like this still exists today in such a developed country)

-ENCOUNTERS AT THE END OF THE WORLD (a great documentary with some simply stunning footage and interesting interviews that collectively provide an insight into life in Antarctica and the important research that is taking place)

-THE CONSTANT GARDENER (a rather sad story about how a drug company exploit the Kenyan population to allow them to test a new drug, despite the fact they know it has harmful side effects - good film for development and globalisation)

- ERIN BROCKOVICH (a good film that presents the negative impacts of the natural gas industry and the extent to which large companies are prepared to go to, to cover this up)

- SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE (provides an insight into the life of children living in the Indian slums - good film to watch for development)

- GANDHI (a biopic about the life of Gandhi with particular reference to his prominent role in India's struggle for freedom from colonial rule)

- CRY FREEDOM (set in South Africa and tells the true story of Biko and his friendship with a white liberal newspaper editor - good film to watch for development)

- THE PAINTED VEIL (set in China, in the 1920's, and explores the impact of a cholera outbreak on a village, including references as to how religious beliefs make containing cholera even more challenging)

- BLOOD DIAMOND (set amid the explosive civil war overtaking 1999 Sierra Leone; it explores many issues including those surrounding the diamond trade, supply of arms to rebels and child soldiers - good film to watch for development and globalisation module)- THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW (after the Larsen B ice shelf collapses, the thermohaline circulation shutdowns, provoking glacial inception in the northern hemisphere - a good film to watch and then point out the geographical/scientific mistakes!)

- GOODBYE BAFANA (follows the unlikely friendship that forms between Mandela and his prision officer - good for development and globalisation)

- INVICTUS (after 27 years imprisionment, Mandela becomes South Africa's first elected president and this film follows his bid to unite the country via the rugby world cup - good film for development and globalisation)

- DARFUR (a group of international journalists travel to a village in Darfur in search of evidence to persuade the UN that genocide has occured but are forced to live after the Janjaweed turn up and threaten to kill them.... a film to watch for either development and globalisation or the population module but be warned it is very graphic)

Geography Books

I am a bit of a bookworm and often prefer reading a good book to watching a film and so (like I am doing with the Geography films) I am going to read some of the suggested books and write a review on them so I can comment on whether or not I think they are worth reading........

- AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH, Al Gore ( presents the issue of climate change and discusses how it has been caused and the impacts it is likely to have - well worth reading but if you prefer the film version is equally as a good)

- OUR CHOICE, Al Gore (this books follows on from An Inconvenient Truth by offering the solutions Al Gore thinks are required to solve the issue of Global Climate Change)

- THE BOY WHO HARNESSED THE WIND, William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer (tells the extraordinary true story of a Malawian teenager who overcame many obstacles to provide electricity and clean water for his village by capturing the energy in both the wind and the sun)

- BLOOD RIVER, Tim Butcher (tells the story of Tim Butchers quest to retrace the journey taken by H.M.Stanley in the 1870's. From this you get an insight into the history of the Congo and the factors that have effected its development - great book for the development and globalisation module as it provides an insight into the impact colonialism has had on Africa)

- GAIA, James Lovelock (presents the Gaia hypothesis which is the idea that the Earth functions as a living organism and so self-regulates to adapt to changing conditions - puts forward some very interesting ideas and really makes you think - it is worth a read!)

- THE REVENGE OF GAIA, James Lovelock (applies the Gaia hypothesis to global climate change - again an intriguing read which presents some interesting ideas and solutions to problems we are likely to face)

About Me

Whilst studying A-levels in Geography, Chemistry, Biology, Maths and History, I became completely fascinated by the Earth Sciences and found them particularly good for feeding my natural curiosity, providing answers to my never ending list of questions! Despite my relentless enthusiasm and frequent question asking, I was quite a quiet student in comparison to the rest of my class so my teacher asked me to start this blog as part of her experiment to test the benefits of incorporating social media into education. The aim was to find out if social networking can be a valuable educational tool and discover how much I actually learnt in lessons. It proved to be a huge success, for both myself and other students, with all my A-level notes still available for students use. I am currently at University studying BSc (Joint Honours) ‘Physical Geography with Oceanography’ and still asking way too many questions! In an attempt to continue to share my love for anything Earth Science-related, and to see if it can have the same benefits at Higher Education, I am trying to continue the blogging and use of social networking. I hope it proves to be a useful and interesting read!

The what, why and how of this blog.......

Hopefully you will have worked this out by now, but this blog is written from a student's perspective and, when combined with my teachers blog, should provide an insight into what I get taught - therefore what I should have learnt - in my Geography lessons. The idea is that this will make it a useful place to go to consolidate your learning; somewhere to go if you didn't quite understand something or missed a lesson. As well as this, posts will be written on anything of general geographical interest whether that be something currently in the news, anything related that I read or watch, anything I do or a topic that I just fancy finding out more about - all of this is designed to broaden our geographical knowledge. When it comes to revision I will try and write up as many notes as possible but it is unlikely that I will be able to cover everything so just let me know if there is anything you would like me to cover. So, thats what the blog is about (simply sharing, with anyone willing to read it, lots of geographical stuff that interests me!) and I am writing it because I tend to get a little enthusiastic about Geography and ask too many questions and so by channeling my interest in this way it will hopefully help you as much as it helps me!!! Whats the best way to use it? Well for starts reading/following the blogs and other resources is the only way you will benefit from them! Secondly, participate and get involved - comment on things, I am bound to get things wrong so correct me, you won't agree with everything I say so tell me what you think and perhaps even suggest things for me to read, watch or look into as I am always looking for new ways to extend my knowledge outside of the classroom. Geography is a discursive subject and, especially with human Geography, for the most part about forming/expressing opinions, so discuss the topics raised via the blogs etc. - trust me, its an easy way to learn!

I am now at University studying BSc (Joint Honours) Physical Geography with Oceanography - to keep my A-level notes separate I have started a new blog for current news and what I am learning in University - anything relevant I will also post on this blog, but please feel free to ask questions or requests posts! I hope students are still finding this a useful resource!

Disclaimer

'What I learnt in Geography this week.....' was created by, with content written by Vicki The Geography Student as part of an experiment conducted by Millie The Geography Teacher.

All posts published are my personal views, apart from where stated otherwise, and not those of the college I attended, my University or associated partners